The Harvest

By K. Makansi

#JoinTheResistance

Remy Alexander wants revolution. After watching Vale fall back into the hands of the Sector, she will stop at nothing to reveal the corruption in Okaria. When she joins a secret Outsider network in the underbelly of the capital city, she must use all her skills as a fighter and an artist to show the people the truth.

Valerian Orlean wants emancipation. When he wakes up in Okaria as a political prisoner and learns what his parents have done to him, he knows time is running out before millions of people are forever enslaved.

In a world where those who rule determine your destiny, and the food you eat can deliver or destroy you, Remy and Vale must come together with the help of new friends and old to cut out the rot of unchecked power before the fire at the heart of Okaria grows to an all-consuming swell—or is extinguished forever.

THE HARVEST, the third book in the Seeds trilogy, brings the terrifying truth of the OAC's MealPak program to light. As injustice spreads throughout the Sector, threatening the freedom of farm workers and laborers in the factory towns, the Resistance must find a way to end the oppressive Orleán administration once and for all.

• Language: English
• Publisher: K. Makansi
• Release date: Apr 12, 2016
• ISBN: 9780989867191

K. Makansi

K. Makansi is the pen name for the mother-daughter writing trio of: Kristina Blank Makansi Born and raised in Southern Illinois, Kristina has a B.A. in Government from University of Texas at Austin and an M.A.T. from the College of New Jersey. She is founder and publisher of Blank Slate Press, an award-winning imprint, now part of Amphorae Publishing Group, and also helps self-published authors on the path to publication through Blank Slate Communications. She has published Oracles of Delphi, an historical mystery set in ancient Greece. Amira K. Makansi Amira is a wanderer of foot and spirit. After earning her bachelor's degree in History from the University of Chicago, she traveled across America and France to learn the trade of winemaking. While traveling, she found her passion for writing through her journal and her blog, The Z-Axis. She is never far from her notebook or journal, and nearly always has a glass of wine or beer in hand. When she's not writing, she can be found with purple hands in the wine cellar, or out walking among the grapevines or live oak forests of the Central Coast in California. Amira has big projects in the pipeline after Seeds, so stay up to date and find her online at https://artz3.wordpress.com/. Elena K. Makansi Elena graduated from Oberlin College where she concentrated on food justice and food system politics. She won several writing and poetry awards and scholarships and attended the Iowa Young Writers' Studio and the Washington University Summer Writers Institute. Elena works as an editor and a cover designer for Blank Slate Communications. As a vegan, she is interested in intersectional food justice politics and animal rights-and in seeking the nirvana of the perfect avocado. Visit her website at elenamakansi.com.

Book preview

The Harvest

Book Three of the Seeds Trilogy

K. Makansi

Layla Dog Press

Saint Louis, MO | Tucson, AZ

Copyright © 2016 by K. Makansi

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Layla Dog Press

St. Louis, MO / Tucson, AZ

Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this book

may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without

written permission from the publisher. For information, contact us through our

webpage at http://www.theseedstrilogy.com.

Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in

violation of the authors’ rights.

This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or

persons, living or dead, is merely coincidental, and names, characters, places,

and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination

or are used fictitiously.

Visit our website at www.theseedstrilogy.com to learn more.

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@readwritenow - Kristy

@akmakansi - Amira

@Elena_Makansi - Elena

Cover by K. Makansi & Kevin Wietzel

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016904048

ISBN: 978-0989867191

For our grandparents,

And for all those who resist oppression

and stand up for justice

PROLOGUE

KANAAN ALEXANDER

Prologue: Sector Annum 52

The arcing shadows of the steel framework bend around me. I cough, the sound muffled by the mask clasped over my mouth and nose. I duck under a torqued I-beam and into a pitch black room. The air dances and swirls, disturbed for the first time in centuries. Increasing the power on my biolight lenses illuminates the room in yellow-green. Dust clouds my vision, gathering like an angry storm.

Find anything interesting?

I cough again, clearing my throat, before I can get out my words. Tell you when the Oklahoma Desert settles, I shout back. You?

Papers, I hear from the adjacent room. Nothing but papers. These people must have cut down enough trees to stack them to the moon and back. His voice is distorted through the haze of debris and ancient metal.

I scan the detritus of the Old World—destroyed furniture, ruined computers, electrical wires, rusted plumbing, crumbling walls—and yes, there, in the corner, bones. A skeleton. Lily-white and grinning, with a long shard of glass still embedded in the rib cage like a hunter’s spear point. Obvious cause of death. I grin back.

That looks painful, buddy, I mutter. Let’s hope I don’t end up like you today.

I glance around, checking that there’s no immediate danger, no wall about to collapse, nothing to crush or impale me like my newfound friend. But everything looks stable. For now.

As the dust settles, I get a better look at what the room contains. I had to slice the door open with my laser cutter, which made me think I might have finally hit pay dirt. To prevent looting or material destruction, most of these old research facilities had triggers to initiate shutdown sequences to secure valuable equipment and data in case of emergency. Of course, my new friend in the corner might have been saved if medics could have reached him—or was it a her? A stomach wound like that would have been easily treatable, especially with the kind of medicine they had back in those days. If those Old World corporations had cared more about their workers and less about their profits, my friend might not have ended up dying alone in a locked room in the first place. But then, judging by the destruction in the area, I’m guessing no one lived for long once the bombs started falling.

I click on a handheld biolight and pan the room, moving deeper into the dark, bumping up against the remains of an overturned table. I squint into the corner, and smile behind my mask. Jackpot. A graveyard. This is exactly why we’re here.

We’ve stumbled on the kind of storage room where old lab equipment went to die, or at least was stored until disposed of. Without even picking through the junk, I can see a few thermal cyclers in various states of disarray, a line of centrifuges on a shelf still clinging to a wall that lists at a precarious angle, two large rotating hydroponics systems—mostly intact, although one is missing a large chunk of metal at the top. Best of all, there are several ancient spectrophotometers. The old sturdy ones, not too temperamental. And that’s just what I’m seeing from a quick scan. I’m betting this equipment was already broken when the lights finally went out, but the Corporation won’t care. Scavengers have already mined all the good stuff. These days, they’ll pay for anything their engineers can fix up into something usable.

We done here? I hear my friend call.

Not a chance, I holler back. We hit gold, Gold.

I hear booted footsteps and heavy breathing behind me. I turn to see his grey-green eyes and black hair sticking out around the straps of his mask. He’s taken the rest of his scavsuit off—including his goggles, I note with consternation—but at least he’s got the sense to keep his boots, gloves, and mask on. His full name is Augustus Orleán, but most everyone calls him August. I just call him Gold, a reference to the shorthand for the element, Au.

I glare at him. Keep your damn goggles on. You don’t know what kind of toxins are—

I’m fine, aren’t I? he interjects as he saunters toward me, his voice deeper than usual and thick through the mask. The creases in his eyes belie the smile on his face. I’m not blind yet.

You’ll be thanking the fates for that once you see what’s in here.

Looking past me, his eyes go wide, taking in the wealth in front of us. He slaps me on the back.

"You weren’t joking, K. This is serious money. If we can get this to the Corporation without getting bushwhacked, they’ll finally load us up with enough seedcoins to set up our lab."

That’s a big if.

He laughs. Always the pessimist.

I prefer ‘practical’.

Then get your practical ass to work harvesting this tech.

Gold pulls his goggles back down, recognizing that we have no idea what kinds of poisons could be in the equipment we’re handling, or in the debris around us. We sort through the rubble, separating obvious trash from things that could have value. Much of the equipment is broken but reparable, and if not, the pieces inside are salvageable. Even things that are broken beyond a hope of reuse can teach us about the Old World.

An hour later, the room no longer looks like a tornado touched down. Everything has been arranged in neat piles based on potential return, and Gold starts browsing through them.

Check this out, I hold a thin strip of metal and tap it in my hand. Gold looks up at me. A backup drive. I found it in his palm. I point to our skeleton friend. Like he held on to it right to the bitter end.

Truthfully, I found it on the ground at his feet, but I’ve never considered myself above a little creative license, especially not when it makes the story so much better.

Intact? Gold inquires, his eyes wide.

I shrug. We’ll see. Want to load it, find out what they were doing here?

Gold and I have been scavenging in and around what used to be New York City for the better part of the last three years. Most of what was Manhattan is flooded, of course, and we don’t have the resources to do a lot of underwater work. Besides, anything we found down there would be corrupted beyond repair. So we work on the outskirts. There were plenty of major companies set up in a ring around the city, too, and we’ve hit a fair few of them in the last few years. We’re trying to get enough funds from the Okarian Agricultural Corporation to set up our own research lab, but in order to do that, we have to bring them equipment. That’s how they trade. We provide them with technology, information, or hardware, and they return the favor with seedcoins. With seeds, we can buy what we need to set up our own lab.

We came here on a rumor from one of the other scav teams that there was a big biotech organization headquartered south of the city. Of course, Gold had to put a knife to a man’s throat to get him to tell us the rumor, but that’s just the nature of scavenging these days. Based on what we’ve found so far, he wasn’t wrong, but the research facilities aren’t here. We were expecting a wealth of lab equipment, but instead we’ve found nothing but basic computers, servers, and papers. Until we hit this room, we thought we’d wasted a week of trekking on a wild goose chase and Gold had been threatening to skin the man who led us here in the first place.

Go ahead and load it up, Gold says. Find out what these lunatics were working on all those years ago.

If it’s even readable, I mutter. It’s probably corrupted. And if not, it could be encrypted. I pull my plasma from my pack and set it within range of our UMIT. I drop the backup drive on top and wait for the data transfer to begin. After a few seconds, my plasma flashes green.

It’s readable. Gold stops what he’s doing to look over my shoulder. We watch as lines of code flash across the screen.

I don’t even recognize that language, Gold says.

No wonder. It’s gotta be at least two hundred years old.

But whether we recognize it or not, my plasma seems to be able to read it, because in a matter of minutes the file is loaded. A prompt appears, asking if I want to open it.

Yes, I respond.

A warning flashes across the screen.

The data type in this file is not approved by the Okarian Agricultural Corporation. Please do not continue.

I glance at Gold, who gives me a slight nod, waggling his eyebrows.

Override, I say. Open the file.

The file opens, and a database appears before us.

Abiu, the first entry reads. Açai, Acerola, Alfalfa, Almond, Amaranth, Apricot, Apple.

The list goes on.

What is this? Gold whispers.

I touch my finger to the screen, landing on one of the names. Amaranth.

My screen divides into columns, and different incarnations of the same thing appear. A three-dimensional, rotational model of a double-helix strand; a long-form notation of the base pairs in the double-helix; and a computational model showing genetic variants within the genome.

It’s a genome, he says quietly, answering his own question. What the hell is amaranth?

It’s a grain.

How do you know?

I like to eat things other than bread and meat occasionally. You’d never heard of corn before I made you eat some.

Fair point. He’s never been the most experimental with his food. Then again, it’s only been the last ten years or so that we’ve had the luxury to be experimental. Before that, we ate what we had and were thankful we didn’t go to bed hungry. Go back to the overview.

The main list reappears. What is all this?

Do you recognize these words? Gold asks.

Some of them.

Sure. Some are easy. Apple. Apricot. Barley. But what’s this one? He points to a strange word on the screen. Avocado.

Never heard of it. Have you?

He shakes his head. "Is all this food?"

I shrug. All the names I recognize are food crops. I sure as hell would like to know what the rest of them taste like.

Do you know how much we could get for this database? He stops looking at the plasma and stares at me with that maniacal look he always gets when he’s got an idea. Eighty percent of his ideas are crap. Fifteen are straight from the looney bin. But five percent are bloody genius, and that’s why he and I are partners. When I glance up, meeting his eyes, I can almost see his mind spinning, eagerly calculating how many seeds we could make by selling this information to the OAC. How much they would pay for this?

Why would we—

Look at the size of that file! What if it’s the genetic codes to every food crop ever sequenced in the Old World? You said your dead friend over there was gripping it in his palm. It has to be valuable! By all that’s sacred, we’d get seats on the Board of Directors just for showing this to them.

My heart pounds, blood rushing in my ears, and I don’t know why. What do you think they would do with it?

Who cares what they’d do with it? We could have everything we ever wanted, K. His eyes light up. The premiere lab in Okaria. The finest facilities in the Sector. We can finally fund our research.

But— I sputter. Turning all this over to the OAC gives me a bad feeling, but I can’t put my finger on why. Their whole goal is to streamline food production. They don’t need the genetic codes to Old World crops. They’ve modified and created their own. Who’s to say they wouldn’t destroy this as soon as we handed it over? Or lock it up and throw away the key?

Who cares? he asks, staring at me as though I’ve lost my mind.

Who cares? I repeat, disbelief leaching into my voice. "Gold, think about it. If this database really does have the genetic codes to every Old World food crop ever sequenced, we wouldn’t need the OAC for seeds anymore. We could sequence our own. We wouldn’t ever need their seedcoins again. Their money would be worthless to us. We could print our own money, our own food, our own crops. Think of the possibilities!

If we don’t tell them everything we’ve found, we’ll be violating the terms of our contract. Our agreement would be void. They wouldn’t owe us anything.

If he’s thinking about the legalities, he’s almost there. He wants to do it. He’s almost on my side.

"Gold, you’re thinking about it wrong. It’s not about what they owe us. It’s about what we owe them. And the answer is: nothing. Ever again."

A slow smile spreads across his face.

Kanaan Alexander, my friend, you are finally learning to think like a revolutionary.

The Harvest

by Gabriel Alexander

Poet Laureate, Okarian Sector

Honeyed light sings across my back

In the garden with loving hands

A pomegranate

A bow across a string.

She stands, palms open

Listen,

Pale green tendrils unfurl

Lemons hang from trees like raindrops

Wheat stalks bend in whirls of sun.

Arise, arise!

The world is alight

Morning dawns and seasons change

We gather, we harvest

For it is more painful to remain in the bud

Than to chance blossom

Just as the mighty oak awaits in the acorn

The butterfly in its chrysalis

And the bird in its egg.

We fall in love

As she blooms

And resurrects us.

1 - REMY

Spring 60, Sector Annum 106, 19h30

Gregorian Calendar: May 18

Shadow.

That’s what I think when I catch my reflection in a window, startled for a moment by the fleeting apparition of someone following me, someone who looks vaguely familiar. After a second’s hesitation, I recognize myself. Six weeks after Vale’s fall, and I am still hiding, slinking through the underground veins of Okaria. I haunt the arteries of the city, spending my days in the sewers, back alleys, and smoke dens. At the Academy, my architecture professors waxed poetic about the beauty of our capital: Think of our city as a living being. A complex ecosystem, a body, pulsing and alive. But our study was limited to the gilded exterior, the glittering skins of biomimicking buildings and lush gardens. We chose not to examine the blood and bones within. There was no reason for me then, as an aspiring professional, to make friends with shadows. But now I have become one.

I pull my hood up and climb the stairs. I bump into someone and mutter an apology. At the top, on the seventh floor, I tap-tap-tap on the door at the end of the hall. Footsteps shuffle inside. The door swings wide and I’m ushered in. It’s all very efficient. The apartment is compact, clean, spare. Moonlight spills through a lone window, and the only sign of habitation is a uniform and shoes folded neatly on the bed.

Meera works on the plumbing and irrigation systems for the capitol building, where Soren and I were held captive, where Vale and Chan-Yu used to work. It’s a good position for an Outsider. Not high enough in rank to draw attention to herself, but she’s well-poised to pick up knowledge and information from around the city. Not to mention she can get from one side of Okaria to the other faster than anyone I’ve ever met. She claims she knows the sewer systems better than she knows the streets. I don’t doubt her.

She opens a box on the table and begins taking out items. Five apples, a pound of smoked elk, root vegetables, various greens. Should last a week if you’re careful.

You’re a lifesaver, I say, grabbing one of the apples and wiping it on my shirt. I haven’t eaten in over twenty-four hours. If I tried to buy food from a restaurant or street vendor, my biomarkers would identify me, and without a manufactured identity to replace my old one in the Personhood database, the authorities would immediately be notified. After Corine Orleán promised to publicly execute me if they ever catch me, I’d rather go hungry than risk identification. Meera is keeping me alive.

Any news? I ask through a mouthful of apple.

She leans forward, a promising flush on her cheeks. A meeting. Her eyes twinkle like she’s presenting me with a precious gift.

I drag a sleeve across my face as juice dribbles down my chin. With who?

A snake.

I arch an eyebrow at her. S¬he giggles. Meera is captivating, her smile contagious, her face open and honest. It’s how she gets around the city as an Outsider. That, and her forged documents. Her wide-eyed innocence is capable of charming everyone she meets—and deceiving anyone who doesn’t know her.

Okay, it’s a guy named Snake. But he slithers around the city, she waggles her hand through the air, silent and deadly. She hisses aloud, as childlike as Osprey.

I’m picturing a guy with bright green hair and fangs.

Oh, Snake is definitely like that. Not the fangs, though. He hides in plain sight. Knows everyone, has contacts everywhere. I always go to him when I need information.

Can he help me find Vale?

If anyone can, it’s him. Tonight, thirty minutes after sunset, at The Elysium. Look for the waiter with purple hair—

Purple?

I told you, he hides in plain sight. Anyway, ask him for the green apple indica. It’s off-menu and we use it as our code. It’s also delicious.

Soon all that remains of my apple are seeds. I toss them in the box and grab another. This is not the first clandestine meeting Meera has arranged for me, but it’s the first time she’s sounded so hopeful.

After Vale’s fall, when the drone whisked him away to the gods only know where, I stayed in the apartment Chan-Yu had arranged for us. Damn the risks, I told myself then. Corine’s promise to execute me most likely meant she’d be looking for me out in the Wilds, or at the Resistance bases. As far as I could tell, no drones or Watchmen were able to ID me, even when Chan-Yu and I were chasing Jeremiah through the city streets. In a way, staying here is safer for me than heading back out with the Resistance. Like Meera’s mysterious purple-haired Snake, I am hiding in plain sight.

I know it’s dangerous to stay, but my instinct screams: I can’t leave Vale. I have to find out what happened to him. Is he alive? Is he with his parents? What have they done to him? And by all that grows, what was he doing on that roof?

Chan-Yu, it turned out, had only paid for the shortest possible lease: two weeks. I spent three nights in the sewers after the rental term was up. That’s when I met Meera. I’d taken to spending much of my time in the smoke dens—places I never knew existed—because it was so easy to blend in. Like everything else in Okaria, the dens are heavily regulated, but they’ve all taken on the personalities of their neighborhoods. With black walls, heavy floor-to-ceiling curtains, dirty velour booths, and small, blood red biolights at every table, Le Mouton Noir quickly became my favorite. It was close to the apartment we’d used, everything seemed to be covered in a thin film of grime, and most of the regulars worked in delivery, water recycling, composting, or bioluminescence, so I knew I was unlikely to run into any of my old friends. The smoke came cheap and plentiful, and escape was just a few puffs away. And the place was open twenty-four seven.

I thought I had changed my appearance enough to go unnoticed, but Meera recognized me right away. She’d been looking for me, she said.

She slid into my booth and offered me a pull from her water pipe. I rarely smoke, finding the atmosphere calming enough on its own. Plus, I was running out of seeds.

My name’s Meera, she said. We should be friends.

I hesitated, trying not to look suspicious. What makes you say that?

Ignoring the question, she held her pipe out to me. This is my favorite flavor. Tastes like black caps. I think you’ll like it.

Black caps. That’s how I knew. It’s what Outsiders call wild blackberries and raspberries. They grow in great brambly bushes in parts of Outsider territory, and every tiny corpuscle tastes like a burst of heaven. Rhinehouse says the Sector’s version, the ones they use in Mealpaks, have been so hybridized they hardly have any taste at all. I don’t even remember eating them when I was younger.

Black caps. Never heard of such a thing. I took a long drag, feeling the calm sink in, remembering how I used to love smoking with Eli, Jahnu, and Kenzie at Thermopylae. Meera leaned in, elbows on the table.

Word on the street is we have friends in common, she said, looking me up and down. You hungry?

Starving. Meera flashed her siren smile, and in the haze of the blackberry smoke, I couldn’t help it. I smiled back.

I can help you with that. Let’s go to my apartment. I’ve got food to spare. We can catch up on how our mutual friends are doing.

I was hesitant at first, reluctant to trust anyone. But after weeks with no news of Vale, no word from Chan-Yu, Soren, Osprey, Miah, or anyone else in the Resistance, I’d finally found someone to talk to. Or rather, someone had found me. My mind foggy with hunger, loneliness, and desperation, I figured if Meera was a spy for the Sector, she’d lead me right to Corine. I was willing to take the risk.

My trust was well-founded. Meera fed me, gave me extra clothes, replenished my disguise makeup, and now she’s going to let me move into her apartment.

Everything is mostly cleaned out, Meera says, pulling a shirt up over her head to change clothes for work. I won’t be far, and I’ll be by every few days with food.

I hate to kick you out of your own place, I say, protesting for the thousandth time and trying not to stare at the scarred lines on her back. One time, I asked how she got her scar, but she just gave me a sly smile and said nothing.

"Remy, you’re not kicking me out. This place is hardly big enough for two and besides, I’ll be staying with a very close friend." She winks.

I think of Vale, the idea of staying with him someday in a warm house, with a proper kitchen, and a real bed. If we live long enough.

If the meeting with Snake goes well, you’ll have a better idea of where Vale is and how you can see him. I’ve got a good feeling about this.

I can’t thank you enough. For everything.

If you ever need to run, there’s a safe house on the outskirts of Okaria the Outsiders stay at sometimes. You might know about it. Her eyes twinkle. It’s your grandfather’s house.

Kanaan’s? I ask, wide-eyed. Outsiders stay there?

On occasion. It’s big, empty, comfortable. What more could we ask for? She squeezes my hand and whispers, We’ll talk soon. Good luck.

It’s still dark—the first hint of dawn is edging the horizon—when Meera leaves. I consider a nap, or a few minutes of quiet meditation, but opt for some of the smoked elk instead. It’s early, and I haven’t slept much tonight, but I’m antsy. Time is running out. How much longer can I stay in Okaria, pawning food from the Outsiders, hanging out in smoke dens, listening, watching, waiting? I am not safe here. One wrong move and I’m done for. Phillip’s goodwill was waning when Soren and I were captured, and I’m sure it’s nonexistent now. If I’m caught again, the Sector will have no mercy, not after Round Barn, not after what I did to Evander.

I pull out my plasma and begin sketching. Where are my friends? Are they safe? How are Jahnu and Kenzie? Has Rhinehouse found an antivirus for Eli? Will I ever be able to see him again?

The sketch morphs into something grotesque. A disembodied mouth, open in a scream, bits of tongue flaking away like burnt paper.

Thirty minutes after sunset, I walk into The Elysium smoke den. Located deep in fashionable South Okaria, far away from the city center, The Elysium couldn’t be more different from Le Mouton Noir. The lights are dim but luminous. Hundreds of tiny green biolights flicker along the walls. The glassware here is polished and fine, the smoke clean, the hookahs as elegant as the patrons. It’s like I’ve entered a different dimension, as if I’m floating in the ocean amidst a sea of glowing plankton. There is an air of intense sensuality. Bodies lean into each other, lovers kiss in the corners, beautiful people sip colorful cocktails, and stained lips pull long drags of smoke from glass pipes. Low, throbbing music plays in the background and conversation is hushed and secretive.

As I pass, one woman gives me a long, inviting look, with a raised brow and full, red lips. She is captivating, to be sure, with long hair curling around her shoulders, wide hips and a small waist. For a moment, I envy her figure, her glamour, her confidence. She is a woman who knows who she is and what she wants.

I shake my head no and raise my hand to the back of my neck, a nervous gesture that has only gotten worse over the weeks. To avoid recognition, I cut my hair with one of Chan-Yu’s knives, left in the apartment after we fled. No more thick, dark curls. Now, just an even tuft of close-cropped fuzz. When I went with Meera to her apartment that first time, she giggled and pulled out an electric razor, offering to shear my hair more evenly than the butcher’s job I’d done with the knife. It looks better, but I’m still not used to it. I want my curls back. When I catch my reflection, my eyes seem too big, my neck too long, all my shapes slightly wrong.

But if I don’t recognize myself, neither will anyone else.

I find a booth and cozy up to the corner, sitting with my back to the wall, scanning the space for a purple-haired man. I don’t have to look hard. I notice him behind the bar, shaking a cocktail mixer. A few minutes later he appears at my table. I don’t know what I expected: someone striking, maybe, someone really tall, or very good looking. But Snake is unassuming except for the hair, which sticks up every which way, with deep purple roots that taper into lavender. He has dark eyes, slightly upturned at the outer edges and shaded by long lashes, but there is nothing truly distinctive about them. His face, though not especially handsome, is trustworthy. Is it just because I want to trust him?

Hello, mademoiselle. I’ll be your server tonight. Would you like a drink, a smoke, or both?

Does he know who I am? I look at him closely, scan the rest of the area quickly to make sure I’m dealing with the right purple-haired man. I’ve heard good things about the green apple indica. That and a tonic, please.

Snake nods. Good choice. There’s a smile on his lips. He backs away, and my heart is pounding. Can I trust this person? I have to believe Meera, but I can’t